Once Bitten
by Meridian1
Summary: AU: Someone's been bitten ahead of schedule. If a bite is a death sentence, then what would give the condemned a stay of execution?
1. Things Go Astray

**Title: Once Bitten  
Author:** Meridian  
**Rating:** R (language, violence)  
**Summary:** AU: Someone's been bitten ahead of schedule. If a bite is a death sentence, then what would give the condemned a stay of execution?   
**Author's Notes:** Welcome to my first alternate universe fanfiction for _Dawn of the Dead_. The muse has run off, left me grasping at straws for continuity-friendly stories, so I'm indulging in the make-yourself-feel-better-because-the-ending-was-not-to-your-liking genre: the AU. So, have fun, play the spot-the-detour-from-the-movie-plot game. In short, enjoy.

*****************

"Get back inside! They're fine!"

"Get back inside!"

"There're still six more people inside the truck!"

"Andre!"

Luda's scream trailed off into a primally fearful howl. He felt like he moved in slow motion, throwing the oncoming ghoul aside, against the bar, then shoving his gun under its chin, pulling the trigger. All too easy, but more were coming, and he'd followed Michael outside for no reason. There were no more bullets, so he ran. Meaty sounds, the impact of steel and flesh, came from behind him as Michael retreated, following him back to the door.

Andre slid inside, breathing a premature sigh of relief.

"Andre, pull!"

A rotting, sun-burnt hand had a firm grip around Michael's wrist even as he tried to close the door on it. Andre leapt forward, threw a quick right hook into the nose of the ghoul keeping the door open. He might have reached for the other gun, but the door needed to be shut _now_. If he waited a second longer...

The ghoul's nose broke noisily under his hand, and, although it seemed not to notice, the momentum of his fist sent it back a step, just enough to lose its grip and for Michael to slam the door shut. Andre threw the bolt and sagged against the comforting strength of the wall.

"Jesus, man, that was stupid."

"Tell me about it," Michael looked rattled as he rubbed his wrist. "Could feel those things practically breathing down my neck."

"They breathe?"

"They do _something_ to make that noise."

Shrugging off a shudder, Andre nodded. "I think that's my last trip outside, man."

"Yeah," Michael agreed, recovering from the adrenaline high. He jerked his chin toward the loading dock gate. "How do we get them out of the truck?"

"Weare _not_ opening that," Andre crossed his arms. This guy could be a tad thick where heroics were concerned. Luckily, he didn't have to make an issue of it. Terry appeared, rounding the corner so fast he only just made the turn by grabbing a support pole.

"Guys! Come on, we need your help getting this one woman out of the truck."

"And how are we supposed to do that?"

Gesticulating madly, Terry shifted his weight back and forth. "Blow torch the top. Come on, come on!" The excitable security guard disappeared around the corner without another word. Michael nodded once, deciding something, and made to follow Terry but stopped on the steps. Andre unfolded his arms when Michael rounded to level a serious look at him, one vaguely apologetic. He was never very good with making or accepting apologies, and so had to restrain himself from fidgeting.

"Andre, I'm sorry."

"Hey, don't worry about it."

"No, you shouldn't have had to risk yourself like that." A pained expression, one Andre couldn't place, chased from one side of Michael's face to the other in a grimace. "Luda needs you." Thoughts of Luda made him feel worse for running out there. She'd want to know he was okay.

"You think you can handle the new guys? I wanna go tell her I'm all right."

"Yeah, sure," Michael said, accepting the responsibility as means of compensation for what he'd nearly cost them both. They were lucky, not a scratch on either of them, so he was inclined to ignore it, or would once his heart quit leaping about his chest. _Not a scratch,_ he reminded himself, a mantra, _not a scratch_.

He caught a faint flash of red against Michael's bronze skin as the other man disappeared. Well, maybe a scratch, maybe Michael had suffered a scratch, but _he_ was fine, and they were both alive. Alive, and that's what mattered. Andre took a deep breath, releasing it slowly to calm his nerves, settling himself before he went to see Luda.

*****************

"The bites killed her. The bites brought her back."

Michael stiffened, alarmed, but it was Andre who spoke, beating him to it.

"How do you know?"

"I watched it happen. I felt her pulse she was _gone_." He watched her reach for the cup, pause. There was more, more she hadn't said and was debating whether or not to mention. Would he have to press her for the information? As it turned out, no. "And...yesterday I saw the same thing happen to somebody else." A heavy swallow, a gasping recovery. That had _hurt_ her. "I think that's why it spread so fast."

He should say something, ask, but, business first. "All right. So who else in the group is bitten?"

"Frank, for sure."

"What about the one with the foot?"

"Tucker? He says no, he fell." Andre's silent departure registered only as passing absence, an aberration that could not dissuade him from the task at hand. An awful thing, this duty.

"Frank. Tall guy, right?"

"Right, so we have to quarantine him right away."

"Where exactly do we do that?" Michael looked up at Kenneth, appreciative. Kenneth had a cop's instincts and had reached the same conclusion. Only Ana stood against them, though he suspected she wasn't yet aware of it.

"I don't know. There must be some place to keep him in here."

"Then what?" _Come on, you know what has to happen._

"I don't know."

"It's too dangerous to keep him around here." _Take the hint, Ana_, he willed her. Anything, so long as he didn't have to say it.

"I'm sorry...what are we talking about here? Are we talking about _killing_ him?"

"Would you rather we waited for him to die and then he tried to kill us?" Think. All she had to do was think about it. She wasn't about to, though, and he could see it. She was feeling, thinking with her heart, her training as a medical professional, not with her head, not with logic. As a result, all she could do was react.

"Yes-no! You can't kill him!"

"Ana..."

"He's got a daughter!"

"I'm sorry. I don't think there's any other choice." He grabbed the gun, nodded at Kenneth, summoning the appearance of confidence. Just keep walking. Just a matter of left in front of right in front of left. Only the weight of the gun threw off his balance, he felt like he teetered, in peril of falling over with each step. Somewhere in the blackness outside of his tunnel vision, he heard Kenneth speak, reassuring him, devastating Ana.

"He's right."

Footsteps, light, _hers_. Her hand on his arm, restraining, urgent but gently.

"Michael, you can't do this. What if I'm wrong?" He could only bare to glance, his eyes sliding over the lower half of her face, not daring to meet her eyes.

Lecturing, admonishing, reminding her. "You've seen it happen before."

Flighty, she shifted between feet as he worked at remaining steady, one foot, the other, and repeat. He watched her run off, sprinting a few yards, hesitating to look his way, absorbing his intent stride, then darting forward again. Kenneth never left the coffee bar, Terry staying with him, probably thanks to a staying look or gesture from Kenneth--a _don't-follow-where-you're-not-welcome, kid_. This was Michael's show, now. He'd presumed to make the decision, so his was the responsibility. Nervously, he scratched at his elbow; the touch burned, irritated skin leaving a trail of red when he pulled his hand away. A double-take, twisting his arm to see, to see clearly.

_Shit_. He could muster no other reaction, not anger, not even denial. His mind went blank, his feet carried him after Ana, towards Metropolis, dumb-struck. Ana arrived only a few seconds before him, but she still had the advantage of speaking to Frank first. If he could think, if his mind could raise itself past its _shitshitshitshitshit_ monologue, maybe he could have dealt better with it. As was, he heard Frank's response to her, could guess what had been said.

"What are you talking about?" The tall guy, half-laughing because no one could take death threats entirely in jest, not any more.

"You're infected. You're going to become one of them."

All eyes on him. It was a reaction he might, absurdly, have to get used to. People here were listening to him, looking to him for ideas, for plans, for help. He knew himself better than that, and now he knew something else, too. If they believed they would look to him for answers forever, they would be sorely disappointed. This was the last thing he could help them with, but maybe he could do it right. Go out with bang, literally.

"Is this true? Are you here to kill me?"

Lamely, he shrugged, hesitant to use that word, that word he'd made Ana say for him because he couldn't. Wasn't ready to accept just yet. "You've been bitten. It's only a matter of time."

"No! No! No! Leave my Dad alone! Go away!" His daughter, defiant, crumbled into her father's embrace, sobbing, her voice growing smaller, pleading, "_you can't do this_." How he wished he didn't have to.

"You have to understand that she's lost everyone. Her mother, her two brothers. I-I'm all she's got."

That wasn't helping. He wanted to shout, _what about me_? The numbness prevented it, made it worse as Ana rounded on him, mistaking his silence for determination instead of confusion.

"Well, Michael, what are you waiting for? Go ahead, kill him." How she loathed him. And they had been getting along so nicely, too, ever since he'd popped Bart in the mouth for that misogynist comment this morning. End of the world, and he still managed to offend every female in his general area. Story of his life. Maybe it should be his epitaph. 

"Hey, kill Tucker, too." _Great_. Sarcasm.

"Wait a minute, I was never bit."

"We can't be sure. Do it, Michael!" _Your fault_. _Your doing, so do it!_

"Are you sure it's the bite?"

"No."

_Oh, no, no, you don't. _She wasn't getting away with that. "She's sure." What that meant, though..._oh shitshitshitshitshit._ Frank looked like he was thinking along the same lines, only he had his daughter with him--another thing he could hate the man for but didn't. What was the point? The girl did it, his heart ached for her. He wanted to hug her, too, like Frank, say goodbye to her and pretend she was his...he had never gotten the chance. For her, for her loss, she said, "I'm sorry."

"Can we...ha-have a minute?" Frank choked, holding his shuddering daughter closer. Michael tucked the gun into the back of his jeans, hiding the weapon as a gesture of peace. _I'm not here to hurt you because I want to_. Ana turned to him, taking exactly one step towards him, invading his personal space. In her life before yesterday, Michael could see her being something truly imposing, definitely intimidating. Her posture, the steel in her spine, the firm grimace set on her earnest lips. He might have backed down but for the defeat in her eyes. In the days before this place, they might have been resolute when she was sure of herself. No longer--she knew now, understood as he did, that while she was right medically, she was wrong _practically_.

"I hope you're happy."

He let her walk out, fought the urge to seize her by the arm. Temper, temper. Changing his mind, he swivelled on his heel, prepared to follow after her. Kenneth stood at the entrance, Terry behind. Michael made to walk on by, to track down Ana, have 'the talk,' their last on the subject. Kenneth's hand on his shoulder brought him up short.

"I got it."

He nodded, wondering how much to say. Someone would have to take care of it, if, in the end, he couldn't. Terry stared at both of them, then at the girl and Frank, comprehending but removed, distanced by shock. Kenneth patted his arm again, redirecting his attention.

"You don't have to watch."

"Yes, I do."

Expecting protest, Kenneth's answering nod surprised him. He moved in slow motion, self-consciously backing away, making sure he faced everyone and kept his back against the wall. Frank, when he was ready, limped past with his daughter clinging to him, aware only of her father, of time passing them by. Kenneth took the lead, and they followed. Terry stared at him, looking again, looking for answers.

"Go check on C.J. and Bart, Terry."

"Why?"

"Let them know..." he swallowed, not sure what flimsy excuse to use. "Tell them there might be gunfire." Forced smile, humorless chuckle, "Don't want them to worry." Terry, confused, remained rooted in place, so Michael left him gaping. He stayed a respectful distance behind Frank and his daughter, idly wondering where they would stop.

Kenneth picked the Verizon store. Death among a thousand unsold models of cellular phone. Reach out and touch someone. A thousand and one inane jingles, pitches, things he was used to making to seal a deal. The things you thought about when confronted with the end. Funny.

The girl brushed him as she left, her face wet with tears, nose running, gasping for breath between sodden sobs. Kenneth looked to him, reaching for the grate. This was it. Do and die time.

"I'm coming," he mumbled, stumbling forward as Kenneth slammed the metal brackets down into place. It was done. Now all that remained was awkward silence while Frank...was infected to death. He still had trouble wrapping his mind around the concept, but the proof he couldn't deny. They had to do something other than wait. The wait could drive all three of them crazy, Kenneth's stoicism be damned. "Frank."

"Yes, uh..." Frank's wan smile was polite, even apologetic, "I'm sorry, I forgot your name."

"Michael," he said, trying to match Frank's good humor. "How long ago were you bitten?"

Frank laughed, the sound dissolving into coughs. "This business or pleasure?"

There wasn't anything pleasurable about it. He only had so much time, he didn't care if he offended, and Kenneth wasn't likely to ask. "It might be important, Frank." Using his name, letting Frank know he regretted what would happen.

"We were in the chapel, after...after Bonnie..." His held fell onto his chest. Sympathetic, Michael crouched closer, comprehending in a heartbeat who Bonnie was.

"Your wife."

"Yeah," Frank's smile was bittersweet. "Our son came home late. He'd been in--in a fight."

"He was bitten?"

"Ye-yeah. He was shook up. We thought we should get him to a doctor. Bonnie stayed with him, and Paul--my oldest boy--he went to the police to file a complaint."

"When did you see your wife again?" That was Kenneth, helping him out; Michael flashed him an appreciative look.

"She came home, told me the hospital was full of people in our son's state. He didn't even recognize her anymore," Frank trailed off, choking. "He bit her. Oh God," Frank dropped his head into his hands. "He _bit_ her."

"And she bit you?"

"We heard on the radio about this church, and Bonnie knew where it was. Glenn let us in..." Frank sobbed into his hands, obscuring his words. They could draw their own conclusions at this point. If Bonnie had gone with her husband and daughter, with a bite, and they were here without her...

"Did your daughter--"

"Nicole."

"Did Nicole see...?" God, how he hoped she hadn't had to see her mother die, turn into one of those things. He struggled against a lump in his throat. No child should have to see that, and maybe Nicole had been lucky, but what about...? Michael couldn't breathe.

"She knows." Frank shook his head. "I said I'd look after her when Bonnie..."

Michael stepped away, leaving Frank to his grief, searching for comfort in his own. Now was the time for silent reflection. A day, Frank had been bitten for less than a day. Frank's sons were dead, his wife was dead, had attacked him. And he, he was going to see Frank die, while Frank cried over a family that was absent, maybe he could weep for his, too.

An hour passed, and another, and Frank sweated them out, offering but few snippets of conversation at first, then lapsing into a prolonged, torturous silence. His face was ashen, blue veins stuck out as if painted on top of his pallid skin. Michael kept his arms folded over his chest, looking out through the grating, hoping Ana would come by, so he could tell her...what? That she was wrong to judge him? What point would that serve?

"You.." Frank's hoarse whisper sent shivers running along his spine, and he turned. Frank heaved, his breathing too labored to last much longer. He spoke to Kenneth, Michael noted, wounded. "You'll watch...every...single second?"

Kenneth nodded. They watched, as they both tacitly promised. Frank accepted this, shaking; then his head fell back, and he ceased to be. Michael held his breath, jumped when Kenneth cocked the shotgun, leveled it at Frank's body and sighted along the length.

"Wait," he stuttered, but Kenneth didn't waver. He'd made it this far, and now his will was failing him. _Damn it_, but he wanted to stop this, deny it. Throughout his sudden moral crisis, Kenneth remained focused.

Fortunately for them, too. A half-formed protest, more coherent, was on his lips when he caught movement from the corner of his eye. Its head--he refused to call it Frank--tilted forward, fixed its exotically necrotic eyes on them. Then it made that sound--the sound that was terror--and lunged. Directly into the burst from Kenneth's shotgun. The top half of the head was shredded where it wasn't blown entirely away.

In the smoke and silence that followed the _thump_ as the body fell, Michael let out a shaky breath. "Jesus." He felt like being sick, made it behind the sales counter before he did. That. _That_ was worse than he had been expecting. How could he go through with it?

"Take it easy," Kenneth's voice was sonorous in the quiet, perfectly balanced. He stood, righting himself, wiping his mouth and shuddering. _Oh God_. Kenneth nodded, signaling that this was done, that he would be fine. Michael watched, dizzy, stupefied as Kenneth walked towards the grate. Slowly, comprehension, cold-hard and concrete recognition rooted heavily in his gut.

"No." The other man made no sign of having heard. "Stop!" His shout brought up Kenneth's gait, spun him around, shotgun at the ready.

"What?"

"Don't open that."

"Why not?"

It was time. Purposefully, he brought his hand up to his face, unconsciously mimicking Frank's gestures of despair. Slowly, he drew his hand up, up to run through his hair and clutch, angry, at the strands, cursing God, cursing fate. His right elbow was pointed at Kenneth, and the bigger man let out a snort of disbelief.

"You can't," he didn't look up. Now that he was saying it, it was hard, it wasn't abstract. Numbness faded as resignation settled. "You can't leave yet."

*****************

The shotgun blast destroyed all her wildest hopes and most fanciful denials. Ana hugged her knees, drawing them up under her chin. _Damn him_, she fumed, despondent, futilely combatant against fate. She was far from maternal, she couldn't comfort Frank's daughter, but she could curse her father's murderer. Michael wasn't Kenneth, he wasn't trained to know how to kill if necessary. How could he, so easily, so eagerly, take Frank off to put a bullet through his brain?

"Ana?" That was Terry, his polite tone unmistakable. She grunted, her barest acknowledgment of his presence. What could he want, or say, to make this reality untrue? What false comfort could he offer? "Ana?" He pawed at her shoulder, too vigorously to be contrite or melancholy.

"What?"

"Kenneth asked me to come get you."

"Why?" _What now_?

"I don't know, he just said he wanted you to come over."

Sighing, resigned. "Where?"

"The cell phone store."

The shot had come from that direction. "Okay," she said, though anything but. Mechanically, she extended her cramped legs--how tight she'd held them against her body, feeling so small. Each step she took would have to rebuild her shattered her faith. Otherwise, when she got there, if she saw...if what was left of..._No_. No time for that, if there was no time to even consider it, there was no time to fail. If Terry could have gone by, seen...whatever, and been fine, she could handle it. She checked his face. Terry was starring, blankly, at his feet; his cap was in his hands, being wrung into knots by his twitching fingers. She softened, squeezed his forearm, and he looked up at her.

"She's in Sanity, crying, and it's such a mess in there..." Terry mumbled, stringing all the words together as one. Was Sanity the mess or was it at Verizon?

"Terry, maybe you could go check on the girl."

"Nicole," Terry smiled without noticing, a sheepish grin, a secret one he couldn't hide because he lacked artfulness in his state of shock.

"Why don't you go make sure she's okay?" _Get lost_, she thought in his direction. _Keep away from these sounds of violence_. Puppy love, so sweet, so innocent, totally misplaced, like the rarest daisy growing among weeds. Irrationally, she wanted to preserve it, fix whatever necessary to keep it for them. _Go away, don't see this_. He took the hint, and she watched him clench and unclench his fists as he walked to the stairs, up towards the music store. _Lucky damn kid_. Her destination would be much less pleasant.

"Fuck," she swore aloud, surprised at herself. She hardly ever cursed. This occasion, however, seemed to call for it. The mobile phone dealership loomed ahead of her, and there could be no point in delay. What needed to happen, would, sooner or later, it did not matter, it would not make it any less gruesome when she got there.

Decided, Ana set an even pace, ready, at last to confront the 'winners.' She tried to dismiss bitterness, to encourage her natural inclination to comfort, to offer support. The memories weren't even a week old. They seemed born of another life, flashbacks leftover from a different version of herself. From a married, happy self.

"When?" That was Kenneth, his baritone unmistakable.

"When we were outside, trying to get Norma and the others out of the truck. I didn't even notice." Michael, sounding weary and something worse, more unstable. As she rounded the corner, she finally spied them. The gate was locked down, sealing off the store, a reasonable precaution to have taken, though useless now, as Frank was, presumably, dead. Kenneth stood, legs shoulder-width apart, an alert stance, just inside the metal grating. Not until she came right up behind him could she see Michael.

His whole figure spoke of defeat, head leaned back against the counter, eyes fixed on the ceiling, long legs kicked out in front of him. There was a smell of sick, more recent than the smell of blood, which, once she spied the smallest streak of red, she avoided investigating further. Michael saw her first, when, eventually, he lowered his head. His expression was neutral but not blank--more like two very strong emotions cancelling each other out: intense scorn warring with desolate self-pity, two waves, traveling with inverted amplitudes, leaving a straight line behind, a dull, glazed look on his weather-beaten face. That smile that never reached beyond to honest emotion, a grin without humor.

"Hey, Ana."

"What did you guys want?" She addressed Kenneth, kept her gaze fixed on Michael. "I figured everything was settled when I heard..." she gestured, helplessly, letting the situation speak for itself.

"I wanted your opinion on something. Your professional opinion."

"Why?" Despite herself, venom rose into her tone, reflexive against the pitiable figure Michael cut, pale and tired. So different from the confident, unrelenting peace-keeper, life-and-death dealer who had taken care of Frank. Images of that Michael goaded her to fury. "What do you want? You want me to search the others? Make sure no bite goes unpunished?"

"Frank had been bitten for about a day. Nothing serious," Michael explained, unperturbed by her vitriol. "How serious was the bite the other woman had? Life-threatening?"

"No," she shook her head, delving into medicalese and then translating what she came up with. "She had a chunk missing out of her upper arm, substantial blood loss, but nothing that would have killed her, not with some treatment, stitches, fluids. I'd say she lost less than half a pint. You can donate that much easily, no problem."

"How many bites did she have?"

"Just the one that I saw."

"How weak would it have made her?"

"Why all the questions? Suspicion flared brighter with each time he spoke in that curiously resigned, clinical tone. "What--"

"Frank was bitten three times on the hand. It killed him in a day. How long had she been bitten?"

"I don't know, at least five hours, that's how long she was in the truck. Michael, what's going on here?" Michael didn't answer. Kenneth grimaced, remaining silent. She puzzled it out. "You want to know how long someone lives once they've been bitten."

"Would be nice to know," Michael agreed, head falling back again.

"Why? Doesn't matter, does it? I mean," she crossed her arms, driving the point home, "we wouldn't want to wait around for someone whose been bitten to kill us, right?"

"Ana," Michael growled, an unusual sharpness to his typically soft voice.

"Give it a rest," Kenneth seconded. "This is not the time."

"What are you talking about?" Kenneth's chiding wore on her nerves, _un_nerved her.

He spoke to Michael. "Show her." It was an order, one he hated to give.

Ana caught Michael's eye, held it. Recrimination, desperation, resignation. Then spite, defiance. Deliberately, he smiled at her, and raised one arm in front of his face. Her brain scrambled, jumping to associate the image with the meaning, with the reason and the understanding.

Dried blood was caked about his elbow in a distinctly mouth-shaped mark.

**Notes:**  
Obviously, you can tell where this alternate universe deviates from the film's story: Michael was bitten when he and Andre went outside the mall, rather than at the end of the film. Despite being an AU, I modified very little from the scenes represented her up until Frank's quarantine. The dialogue is taken from the movie, save for the interlude after Andre and Michael make it inside the door, and what had to be added after they make the decision to kill Frank because it was not shown. However, while the dialogue is the same, I altered the company present to hear it. In the film, Kenneth and Terry followed after Michael and Ana. Here, they stay behind long enough so as to avoid having either one spotting the plot device.


	2. From Bad to Worse

Title: Once Bitten

Author: Meridian

Rating: R (to be on the safe side, mostly)

Author's Notes: Well, it took a while, but I've finally figured out where to go with this story. Hope I haven't lost you folks in the interim. Enjoy.

* * *

"What's to debate? I say, shoot him." 

"Duly noted, Steve, but overruled."

Ana folded her arms across her chest, put all her weight on one foot so she could tap the other in annoyance, and raised an eyebrow at him. In a hospital setting, where people might be subdued by such a show of authority, it might have worked to end the discussion. As authority was severely in question at the Crossroads Mall, Steve had little trouble brushing her off.

"Hey, look, don't think I'm not grateful, I am. But I didn't spend five of the sweatiest hours of my life in the back of the van only to be eaten by my rescuers." He swilled the last of his third bottle of water and jumped to lay it up into a waste bin in Hallowed Grounds. He sure as hell didn't seem anything like what Ana might have considered grateful. They were talking about murder, and Steve was shooting amateur garbage hoops.

"I don't understand," Glenn murmured, his perpetually dazed look now featuring a furrowed brow. From what little she'd gleaned of him, Glenn struck her as an immensely religious man-he had prayed over the body of the unnamed woman after Ana had shoved a poker through her head. Murder was definitely on his long list of sacred taboos, but survival instincts were fighting to gain control over his highly developed system of morality. "I don't understand," he repeated, shaking his head.

"Understand _what_?" Monica rolled her eyes, sneering at Glenn when he cast a sharp, fleeting glare at her. "What's to understand? The guy got bit. Steve's right, he has to go."

"That's what I don't understand," Glenn retorted, a bit of an edge to his normal mumble. "I don't understand why we even need to have this discussion if you all have already decided what you're going to do."

"We _haven't_ decided, that's the point," Ana reminded him. "I am _not_ cool with this."

"And you are...what? One out of all of us?"

Steve swept a hand over the crowd, Norma, Glenn, Monica, and Tucker. All new people, she mused, frowning. Terry hadn't reappeared after she sent him after Nicole. Kenneth was still babysitting Michael, locked down for the group's safety. They shared that much in common with C.J. and Bart, who were contained in the mall's security office. Andre said Luda needed a lie-down, and he was with her in maternity store on the first floor.

All this added up to her being alone. Not that she hadn't been the sole voice of dissent before, when Michael and Kenneth and Terry had decided to kill Frank. However, the strength of Kenneth's tacit agreement with Michael's shrewd assurance was something she lost with _personally_. The group from the van-and no matter how hard she tried to integrate them in her mind, they were still the 'group from the van'-didn't know the people involved and were outnumbering her rather than out-reasoning her. She felt more inclined to argue with the likes of Steve and Monica over morality than she had with Michael and Kenneth.

"I am the only person trained as a medical professional here. That means _I_ make decisions about who is _medically_ salvageable and who is not."

"Oh, right, okay, so what?" Steve crossed his arms, mimicking her posture, flashing his expensive watch. "How are you going to do that, doc? Gonna stop him from eating us all with some tactfully deployed gauze?"

Steve had made his point. She conceded that, by her own diagnosis, Michael had a fatal disease, one that, outside the mall, had reached epidemic, even cataclysmic proportions. That didn't mean shit. She still got to make this decision, not _him_.

"The point is not how we're going to keep Michael alive, Steve. The point is how we're going to do our best not to kill him and to keep him from dying in the first place."

"Could we have saved Frank?" This was Glenn, inserting his troubled piety into a fight between her dogged dogma of saving lives and Steve's nonchalant adherence to survival of the fittest.

"Probably not."

"You're gonna have to better than _that_," Monica goggled at her, smoke streaming through her nostrils. She considered her cigarette thoughtfully for a moment then looked back at Ana. "I go in to see my doctor last week and he tells me that at the rate I'm going with these-" she waved the cigarette stuck between her index and middle finger, "-that I'll be dead in twenty years, lung cancer, emphysema, whatever. He had a time line for that, can't you make a guess? What's the rate of survival or whatever?"

"As far as we've seen, zero," Ana shrugged, trying to pretend this didn't sound as bad as she knew it must. "But-"

"But nothing," Monica shook her head. "Anyone who gets it, _gets it_." She tilted her head to the side, eyes flashing. "Got it?"

"I don't think _you_ get it. _Any_ of you," she glowered at the assembled parties equally. "There is no such thing as a one-hundred-percent communicable, one-hundred-percent fatal disease. Highly communicable, yes. All the time? No. People can contract HIV without ever having full-blown AIDS. You can sit in a room full of people with colds and not come down with one. The most famous outbreak of typhoid was started by a woman who carried the pathogen but never succumbed to the disease. Christ, even Ebola's got a twenty-percent recovery rate."

"What are you saying exactly, doc?" This was Tucker, the sole person who appeared to be at all interested in this news.

"All I'm saying is that not everyone who is bitten may die from the bites."

"Frank did," said Steve, shrugging.

"So did that woman," Monica agreed.

"Reverend Phillips did," Glenn added, quietly, lost in his own memories.

"That doesn't mean _everyone_ does." Her voice sung with panic, desperation, and denial. Not_everyone_, surely. If _everyone_ who was bitten died, how the hell would humanity survive this?

"Who're you kidding?" Monica snipped, triumphant.

"Okay, fine."

This was such a departure from the course they expected of her that Ana had them momentarily stunned.

"Fine?" Poor Glenn looked more confused than ever.

"Fine. Your opinions and objections have been duly noted."

The other shoe firmly dropped, the spluttering started anew.

"You don't have the right-"

"What makes you think we'll-"

"Who put you in charge?"

That last one she could answer.

"I did. I put me in charge of being the only person here capable of thinking about what's _right_versus what's _safe_. It's a risk, I know that, but we've got Michael contained, and Kenneth hasn't missed yet...if it comes to that."

"And 'fuck you' to the rest of us, that about it, honey?"

"No," Ana snapped, "It's 'fuck you' to the rest of you and a particular 'fuck you' to _you_, Steve." Swiveling on her heel, Ana stomped off towards the cellular outlet to give Kenneth and Michael the 'good' news. At least, she hoped they considered it good seeing as no one else seemed to.

For a fleeting moment, she imagined what life might have been like if she hadn't been put in this position. If Michael hadn't been bit. But why stop there? What if Frank hadn't been bitten? What if Luis or Vivian hadn't? Or she could go the other way. What if she _had_ been bitten? What-fucking-if?

"Hey," she greeted Kenneth, who nodded severely at her. Michael waved, seemingly calmed. Someone had brought him a book to read, Albert Camus' _The Stranger_. An odd choice, rather more academic than she would have expected for a last read. A slim volume, he still probably wouldn't have time to finish it. "You guys doing all right?"

"Better," Michael said, flipping a page. "Terry picked up something for me to, uh, pass the time with."

"Kenneth?"

"I'll be fine for a few hours."

"What do the others think?"

She shrugged. "I don't really value their opinions much."

Michael laughed, humorlessly. "I think I can guess why." He returned to his reading.

"Do you guys need anything? Water, food?"

"Water," Kenneth requested.

"Don't waste anything on me," Michael said flatly.

"Hey."

He looked up at her. "What? I'm just being practical."

"No, you're being defeatist."

"Realistic."

"Pessimistic."

"Whatever," he waved her off, "I'm right, aren't I?" He folded over a corner of his book, closed it, let it fall to his side. "Ana, you guys are going to need to conserve resources. You have no idea how long you're going to be stuck here."

"Any signs of helicopters?" Kenneth, always an eye on the outside, even when stuck inside. She shook her head; Norma had gone up to see shortly before Ana blew up at all of them in Hallowed Grounds.

"You're here for a while, Kenneth," Michael said, apologetically, then turned back to her. "I would do an inventory of what you've got to eat and drink. Eat what's going to spoil first, save chips and stuff for later."

"That sounds like a plan," she stammered, surprised. She'd come to offer some comfort, to show she was on his side against the others, and he was talking about how to keep her alive after Kenneth blew his head off.

"Electricity, too. This place probably eats up a lot of juice. Who knows when the power might get cut off?"

"I'll have to talk to C.J."

Michael chuckled, this time sincerely. "I don't envy you that. If he doesn't cooperate, you could threaten to let me bite him."

Stricken, she almost cried. "Don't joke about that!" She took a deep breath, concentrated on settling her temper. "I haven't given up yet, Michael. I still don't believe this thing can't be beaten."

"Okay."

"Okay?" She eyed him, warily.

"Okay, you go ahead and believe that. In the mean time, you better double-check everyone for bites."

"That's a good idea," Kenneth rumbled, thoughtfully.

"Something on your mind, Kenneth?"

"That skinny brother, he went outside, too."

"Andre?" Michael was quiet as he thought about this. "I was the last one back inside. He seemed fine."

"Nah, that's not it," Kenneth shook his head. "He was acting squirrelly when you were telling us about Frank," he nodded at her.

"You think he's got something to hide?" Despite her words, Ana couldn't deny a surge of panicky adrenaline at the thought of a bitten Andre walking among them, dying, coming back, attacking. He was a big guy, especially compared to her; if he turned, he'd kill her-or worse-easily.

"I'd keep an eye on him."

"I'll have everyone check themselves over for bites."

"No, you do it," Michael told her. "You're the nurse. You have the know-how, you know what to look for. Some of them might not know the difference between a scratch and a bite, especially if it's old. The last thing you need is to have people start turning on each other because of cuts and scrapes."

"God," Ana ran a hand over her face, rubbing especially hard at her forehead. "How do you think of these things?" She thought only of the immediate problems-saving lives, healing wounds-but Michael had his eye on the future-securing the mall, checking for bites, taking necessary measures.

"Someone has to," was all he had to offer. "Kenneth's right. Check on Andre."

"He might be resistant."

"Then wait for me," Kenneth growled. "I won't be long." He glanced at Michael, then murmured something like an apology.

"Don't sweat it." Michael shrugged, picking up his book again. "See you, Ana."

"I hope so," she nodded, and walked away before tears could choke her up. She passed the crowd at Hallowed Grounds, sparing none of them a look or a word, leaving them in suspense as she headed for Bookmark. She fell onto the leather couch there, hugging herself. This is where she'd sat waiting for the gunshot that ended Frank's afterlife.

But she couldn't do it twice. The comforting silence of a book store, so much like the intelligent quiet of a library, only made her edgy. She stood up again after not more than thirty seconds fidgeting in her seat. Wandering through the depths of the store, she found herself in the literature section, stopping at the Cs. There was a gap on one shelf where one copy of Camus' _The Stranger_ had until recently sat. She picked up another copy, plopped down, sitting Indian-style in the middle of the row, and opening to the first page.

_Maman died today. Or yesterday, I don't know._

The book slipped from her fingers as she began to, finally, mourn in earnest. For Vivian. For Luis. For a woman with no name. For Frank. For Michael. For herself.


	3. What to Do When the Sky Is Falling

Title: Once Bitten

Author: Meridian

Rating: R (mostly for language and violence)

Author's Notes: Wow, when it rains, it pours. Enjoy!

* * *

Her arm hurt, a dull, throb, as if it were constantly irritated. She'd taken to wearing only short-sleeved tops to avoid anything touching it. Andre said it didn't need a bandage because it had stopped bleeding. She wondered about that, but she trusted him.

The baby kicked, and she forgot all about her arm.

* * *

"Terry," Ana nodded to him as he arrived, Nicole in tow. It had taken a couple of hours, but she had agreed to come out of Sanity. She'd cried on him, which was rather alarming and disconcerting for a while until he realized he didn't really need to say anything; she just needed to cry and have someone be there, and he was that someone. Now, she was holding his hand, wiping her eyes on his sleeve, and sitting close to him. That, too, made him anxious, in a stomach flip-floppy kind of way.

"Well?" Steve sipped a cappuccino, which he, remarkably, had known how to make. His clothes were rich enough; maybe he owned a machine at home. Terry could almost taste his latte-maybe Steve would take requests.

"You have somewhere else to be?" Ana crossed her arms and glared at him. Steve didn't seem as impressed with that as he was. Ana kind of scared him, but then again a lot of things scared him over the past twenty-four hours.

"I could be napping."

"I asked you guys back here so I could tell you that I'm going to be checking for bites."

"Given up on Slim Jim, have we?"

"You get to go first, Steve," Ana said, eyes narrowing at him. "All of you are to come over to Gaylen Ross and pick a dressing room and wait for me."

"Not a chance," Monica scoffed, flipping her hair. "I'm fine." She'd shed the shirt with the Jackson Pollack bloodstains she'd arrived in, switching to a paper-thin, translucent pink peasant shirt. Terry could see her bra through it, which he gathered was the idea.

"You don't have to get checked over, Monica." Ana shrugged, unimpressed.

"Hey, not that I'd pass up the chance for a physical," Steve winked at her, "but why is she exempt? This female stuff? Woman's intuition?"

"No."

Steve had a point, he guessed, but he was missing something. Ana was a dangerous negotiator, as he had already learned. She took no prisoners. "What if we don't get checked out, Ana?"

She smiled without taking her eyes from Steve and Monica. "Anyone who isn't in Gaylen Ross by the time I count to ten gets locked in Verizon with Kenneth and Michael."

There were a few short exclamations and protests, but he missed them because Nicole shuddered and buried her head into the crook of his shoulder. By the time he got his wiggling insides readjusted, the furor was at a fever pitch.

"That's murder!"

Ana's smile turned cruel and hard. "If you're not bitten, you shouldn't have anything to hide from me. If you have been bitten, you're dead anyway. _Right_?"

At this, Nicole burst into tears and tore away from him. Stunned, he was on his feet to follow her when Ana caught his arm.

"Tell her I'm sorry," the petite nurse implored him. He noticed for the first time that her eyes were shiny and blood-shot, the way people who prevent themselves from crying too long or who had wept too much looked. He nodded and ran out, just catching a glimpse of Nicole's brilliantly red hair as she rounded a corner, right back towards Sanity. But when he stopped there, the store was empty, and the door in back firmly closed. He glanced around, hearing shouts punctuated by cool silence-probably Ana speaking-at Hallowed Grounds.

Nervous and desperate, he looked around Sanity helplessly, coming out and looking right and left for Nicole. Then he saw movement in front of him, a door swinging shut in...Gaylen Ross. Terry walked across the aisle and into the clothing store, and Nicole's snuffling, hiccupping sobs directed him to the dressing room stall on the end.

"Nicole?" Panicking when she didn't answer, he jerked open the door and got hit in the face with her bra. A pretty girl was naked from the waist up and rapidly losing clothes, and he was the one embarrassed, gaping stupidly at her, at his reflection in the mirror.

"Close the door," she growled, still peeling away her jeans. They joined her baby-doll shirt on the floor as he stepped back. Her hand came down on his as he tried to close the dressing room door. "You stay." Her request was so entreating, he could not deny it. He ignored traitorous voices that blamed his enthusiasm on being in close quarters with a naked girl, and pulled the door shut behind him.

"Take this off," she sniffled, tugging his dress work shirt out of his pants. "We have to," she said by way of explanation. Fumbling with his belt, Terry wanted to fly out of his skin. He should be comforting her, doing _something_, but he didn't know what. If getting undressed was what she wanted him to do, though, he had no problems with that. She kept touching him, pulling on his shirt and ripping the buttons. Oh well, he'd never have to dress up for work again anyway.

She had him down to his undershirt and boxers before her fingers started trembling. Without warning, Nicole flung herself into his arms, and they crashed together in the wall, sliding down it until she was crying in his lap. Awkwardly, he wondered where to put his hands, how to hug her, when all she wore was her underwear.

"Please," she whimpered pressing her face into his neck; he could feel how hot and wet her cheeks were. It broke him. Unaware of impropriety, he wrapped his arms around her as she curled up, fisting her hands around his waist and at his shoulder. She cried harder, but he could tell from her nuzzling and strong embrace that this was not a bad thing.

Bizarrely, he thought of his mother, and how she would have reacted if she found him with a girl like this. His mother was the reason he hadn't dated until college, and, even then, he was still sort of afraid to touch his girlfriends. Respect for women hadn't featured much in his mother's house; fear of them, however, had. _Women can break you, Ter. _Ter. She always called him that. _Women are vindictive, and they'll trap you, take it from me. You might think they love you, but they're just using you because you're pretty. Get themselves knocked up, hold you down, take away your future. Don't let me catch that happening to you, hear?_

"I envy you," he said, not sure why. Because he wanted her to have something to be happy about, even if it was mean.

"What?" Nicole snorted back a sob and gazed up at him with those perfectly blue eyes, now green-tinged next to the red of her puffy eyelids. She was beautiful.

"You dad loved you."

This didn't, as he expected it to, make her cry. "Yes," she whispered, barely breathing. "He did." She stared through him, and he wanted nothing more than to brush away that one tear sitting in the cook between her eye and the bridge of her nose. Then he face got this sharp look about it, and he expected the sobbing to start in earnest. "Didn't yours?"

"My dad did," he nodded. Loved him so much he divorced that crazy woman and got Susan. He loved Susan, but she came too little, too late. _You probably don't like me moving into your mom's place, Terry, but that's not what I mean to do._ Susan had a rich Texan accent and beautiful hair, like Nicole's but darker. _I mean to put some love in your Dad's life and maybe a little extra in yours. Hope you won't mind me sayin' so, but Peter tells me you could use some_. And now, she was dead, and there was a naked girl sitting on his lap at work. Well, sort of work.

He started laughing, quickly reassuring Nicole it wasn't her or anything about her, and telling her the story. She listened keenly, the way Susan used to-as if she actually cared to know and wanted to remember every detail.

"Your turn," he prompted when he ran out of things to say. She took a deep breath and started to tell him about her brothers. He kept thinking of things he'd forgotten to tell her-how Susan hated exercising but loved to take the dog on two hour walks, how his dad smelled like Old Spice, how his mother showed up at his graduation and slapped him hard. _So you'll always remember this day_, she'd said. _You're supposed to do that to your girls when they get their period, but I only ever had you_. Then walked away. He never intended to see her again; he hated to think of this as his wish being granted.

Nicole stopped speaking when they heard the others coming, but she didn't let him go. They weren't discovered by his mother but by Ana, who found them with preternaturally good instinct, arriving ahead of the rest of the group and opening the door only a little way.

"Can you two check each other over while I do the others?" He nodded; he needed to be more helpful. "Good," and she left. Nicole didn't move, didn't acknowledge Ana's presence or departure. Tactfully, keeping his eyes on safe spots, Terry let his gaze fall to her back and bare arms. There was no blood, no cuts, and no bruises. Her skin was pale and freckled _everywhere_, which led his imagination down a very nineteen-year-old track, and thinking of his mother didn't make it stop.

When he looked at her again, she smiled.

"You're blushing."

* * *

Ana held the dressing room stall door open as the last of the new group exited. Tucker was in no shape to running around, so she'd ordered them to get undressed, while she went back to check on him. True to his word, other than his foot, he had no injury.

"Take it easy on that leg," she instructed, and left to perform the rest of the checkups. No one else was bitten, thank God. All that left was Andre and Luda. Terry and Nicole hadn't emerged either, but Terry she was sure about, and Nicole had looked all right when she'd ducked her head in. If there was a problem there, she trusted Terry would tell her.

"Here you are."

_Jesus_. She jumped, spinning about to see who'd surprised her.

"Kenneth? Kenneth, what the hell are you doing out here? Where's Michael?"

"Still locked up, that's why I came to get you."

"You should have sent one of the others."

"I don't trust them," he shrugged, turning on his heel. She followed, bewildered and flighty. Leaving Michael alone, if he was sick, was just not a good idea. God. She almost smacked herself. No matter what she said to the others, she was no better; in her mind if not her words, Michael was as good as dead.

"Hey," Michael smiled, waving to them from the desk. Kenneth stooped to unlock the metal gate, gestured for her to go in ahead of him, and slammed it down behind them. It still smelled of death and sick.

"What's going on?"

"Not sure. Kenneth didn't say anything to me. Just said to behave myself." He put his book down. In the few hours she'd been busy, he'd been productive; he marked the book well over halfway through it.

"Take a look at his arm," Kenneth nodded at Michael.

"Oh, shit, right," she rubbed her forehead. Damn it, she ought to have done that right away. She took an alcohol wipe out and tore the corner off with her teeth, dropping to her knees next to where he sat. He pulled his arm away from her when she reached for it. "Stay still."

He pushed her hand away. "No. Save it."

"Likewise," she snapped, grabbing his arm. This time, he let her, twisting it so she had better access. His skin was warm, dry, and rough on his elbow where she cleaned the wound. It wasn't deep, more of a scrape, though the canines had left good gouges in his flesh. She probed it with two fingers, careful to keep the wipe between her and his wound. Now that she knew how the disease spread, she wasn't taking any chances.

"Does it hurt?"

"A little, yeah."

"Any joint pain or localized pain?"

"Nah, just feels like a cut."

"That's it?" The skin around the bite was inflamed, pinky-red and puffy, but no better no worse than any normal wound. "I should have cleaned this before. Human mouths carry so many germs. God." She talked to hear herself, to not have silence. Michael silent was unnerving. "You'll be lucky if it doesn't get infected."

"Ana." She risked a glance at him. His warm brown eyes were tired, his bronze lids heavy. "It _is_ infected."

"Not like that," she hastened to explain. "I just meant..."

He reached out and brushed her cheek with his thumb. She went rigid as he smiled, so benignly, so knowingly. She knew at once that he'd guessed she'd been crying. "It's okay."

"It's not," she whispered, ducking and sniffing hard to clear her sinuses and keep from tearing up again. She bandaged his arm with gauze, taping it in place. She stood, brushing off her hands on her jeans and tucking a strand of hair back behind her ear. Kenneth stood in her way. "Something else?" She reached automatically for his arm, but he shook his head and jerked his chin in a direction she'd consciously avoided looking when she came in.

"There's something you should see."

Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, she reluctantly turned and stared at the floor, steeling her courage as she walked her eyes up the body from the shoes to the head. Half of Frank's head was gone. Just gone. Oh, there were _parts_ of it all over, but none of those parts resembled what had been there.

"His hand," Kenneth brought her back to herself. When Kenneth had shot him, Frank had fallen onto his back, palms down. The bites on the one were dull maroon and black, and-she let her mouth fall open, almost retching-_oozing_. She withdrew a pair of latex gloves, snapping them on and creeping closer, holding her breath. Lifting Frank's hand, she got a better view of the wound.

She saw _everything_ as an ER and trauma nurse-gun shots, knifings, car crashes, fight leftovers, even a stab wound from a bayonet once-but she could align nothing in her medical repertoire with the marks on Frank's hand. They _were_ bites, but they healed or scarred like nothing she'd ever come across, and that was saying _a lot_.

"It's like they're infected, or they opened up again after healing. I don't get it."

"That's not normal? Even for a bite?"

"Nothing about this thing is normal," she tilted the hand this way and that to confirm what she was seeing. "It's healed, probably when Frank was..." she couldn't say it. A stubborn lump in her throat refused to let the word come out: _alive_. "But it's decayed. That makes no sense."

"The skin couldn't just die around the bite?" Michael chimed in from where he sat; he hadn't moved any closer, and she couldn't blame him.

"Yeah, but this is necrosed tissue. You usually only see this hours and hours later. And it's just around the bite." Like just the bitten skin had aged a full day beyond the rest of the body. "This isn't puss, either," She daubed one finger at the oily substance, rubbed it between her fingers. It didn't smell like puss, though it still managed, just her luck, to smell awful. The consistency was wrong, too, as was the color. Plasma? Maybe.

"It started to look bad about an hour before he went." Kenneth supplied, helpfully. She considered this.

"You're sure?"

"Pretty sure."

"I don't understand why it heals and then...doesn't." Again and again, she ran the symptoms against infections she knew. They all inflamed gradually or instantly, puffing up a wound, leaking various secretions. Skin died, tissue wasted if cut off from blood flow, like the way Frank's bites did, but that had come _after_ the blood had reached the bite to heal it. Platelets, clotting factors, the works.

"As dumb as this sounds," she broke it down for her audience, "It wouldn't have stopped bleeding if there was no blood reaching the bite."

"Meaning?" Michael's voice was keen, interested.

"The wound would have remained raw and bloody then just dried out if blood couldn't reach it. But it _did_." She looked over at him. "Let me see your arm again." Obediently, he held it out when she approached him, and, tossing her gloves aside, she opened the tape a little. Still normal.

"We have to keep an eye on this," she closed the bandage again, not meeting his eyes. "If it starts to go bad..."

"We'll know before that."

"What do you mean?" She listened as he explained the wasting away Frank had gone through, the sweating, the gradual loss of breath until he was wheezing, the way his veins had stuck out under his skin. It revolted her. The only other person she'd see change was Luis, and maybe the woman from the van, though she couldn't be sure what had been infection and what injury with her. Luis, though, he hadn't looked like Frank; he'd been bloody-_his_ blood-and his eyes were startling and cold, but not like _that_.

"Jesus, what _is_ this thing?"

"You check everyone else out?"

She nodded, clearing her head. "Yes, except for Andre and Luda." Oh _shit_. _Luda_. "Holy shit."

"What?" Michael nudged her. "What?"

"When you went down the hall to check the doors, one of them attacked us." It had been wearing a uniform like Terry's. When she'd seen them, she'd almost fired without thinking. "He tried to bite her."

"Damn," Kenneth swore, shaking his head. "Didn't even think of her." He nodded to Michael. "She's right. Bastard had her arm, he might've gotten her."

"You were preoccupied," Michael pardoned them. "Your arm, running away someplace safe."

"Shit," she repeated, swallowing distastefully. And she'd been worried about Andre being bitten? If Luda were, and she turned... There was no easy way to say it. If Luda turned, Andre was a problem; he struck her as more than just a little fanatical about his wife and child-to-be. It explained his behavior, though. The last thing they needed was Luda to turn and Andre to defend her.

"Michael, what do we do if Luda's infected?"

"You can't let her run around."

"But she's pregnant." Even as she said it, she knew it made no difference. That baby shared everything with its mother save for blood. If this disease could jump from a bite to a wound, it could go from mother to baby in the womb.

"That skinny cat's not gonna like this, is what she's saying," Kenneth grumbled. "You wait for me to approach them."

"No way," Michael shook his head. "Frank turned in a _day,_ you heard him. It's been more than that since she was bitten. We have to get her up here now."

"What about you?"

Michael scratched at the stubble on his chin, eyes blank and dim. "I think I'm okay for a few hours. I managed when Kenneth left to get you. Get Terry to watch me if you want while you check Luda."

"Twenty-four hours. If that's the shortest time, you're still fine." But she would go get Terry, or maybe Tucker. Norma had said he was a good shot. Michael, as if reading her mind, took out C.J.'s gun from his pants and held it out to her.

"Get someone, Ana. This has to stop here."

She nodded, tucking the gun into her hip satchel. If not here, then nowhere. She nodded to Kenneth, taking the keys and unlocking the gate.

"Let's go."


End file.
